


All I Want

by masulevin



Series: Northern Lights [5]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy, Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Daddy Issues, Dirty Talk, Doggy Style, Drinking, F/M, Felching, Flirting, Heart-to-Heart, Miscommunication, Nicknames, Oral Sex, POV Multiple, Quickies, Semi-Public Sex, Synthesis Ending, Teasing, Unsafe Sex, but not in a weird way, minor Kaidan Alenko/Steve Cortez, past Samantha Traynor/Shepard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-02-18 13:00:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18700102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/masulevin/pseuds/masulevin
Summary: Avery's been a little weird since their last night together, and James hasn't had a chance to tell her he's finally shipping off to N7 training. When she finds out from one of his friends, he's not sure she's going to be okay.(There's smut at the end, promise. You just gotta get through some feelings to get there.)





	All I Want

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on the last train home  
> And you call my phone  
> To say I love you is too strong  
> But you are all I want
> 
> "All I Want" by Stonefox

Things are kinda… awkward. He’s not really sure how, because she’s definitely not mad that he broke the bed, and she’s not mad that the condom broke, so the fact that her responses to his messages have slowed down tells him she’s mad about  _ something  _ just not what he did or what he can do about it.

He has an uncomfortable suspicion that it’s because he accidentally almost tried to ask her to become exclusive; even though he changed his mind at the last minute, she has to know what he was going to ask. She’s a smart woman, probably smarter than him, and even though he told her to forget it… she has to know. 

The question is: is she upset because he brought it up or because he didn’t follow through?

He’s staring at a little display of potted plants in the store, hands on his hips, trying to decide if showing up with a plant instead of flowers, since bouquets haven’t quite made their reappearance yet, would be weird, and if it isn’t weird, if she would even  _ like  _ that and not think he was creepy. He came to the grocer with Sam, and she disappeared the second they stepped foot inside -- or maybe he stopped walking and she just continued -- and so he can’t even ask her for help.

He doesn’t know anything about houseplants. He doesn’t even have a  _ house.  _ Does Avery even like plants? Her place was pretty bare, but was that because she’s the type of woman who can’t keep plants alive, or because she was too busy to actually buy any?

He’s just given up and resigned himself to dragging Sam back to help him when he sees something he  _ never  _ thought he’d stumble across in a million years -- Sam and Avery chatting like old friends over a display of fresh fruit. He literally comes to a full stop at the sight, bowled over by a sudden sense of unease as both women turn to look at him at once.

Sam grins, but Avery just stares at him with a kind of confused expression that would have been adorable if he wasn’t worried about what they were talking about. Had Sam just walked up and introduced herself? Did they already know each other?

He forces his feet to carry him forward, now glad that he didn’t pick up any of the potted plants, and shoves his hands into his pockets because he doesn’t know what else to do with them.

“I invited Avery to your going-away party,” Sam says, lifting her eyebrows and giving James an extremely pointed look that makes his heart just sink right through the floor. “She said she’d think about it, but I’m sure you can talk her into it.” She turns back to Avery and brushes her fingers across her forearm in farewell. “It was nice to finally meet you! See you tonight!” 

Avery doesn’t have a response to that, but Sam doesn’t wait for one. She pushes past James and elbows him on her way by, heading to a part of the store he knows doesn’t have anything they need, and that somewhat obvious exit just makes his stomach sink even more.

Avery’s still blinking at him, expression slowly hardening into something he can’t read but he’s sure doesn’t mean anything good, and then she heaves a heavy sigh and rubs at her forehead with her hand that’s not white-knuckling her little shopping basket.

“I thought you were already an N7.”

James clears his throat. “I didn’t get the recommendation until the reapers attacked. I still have to go to training.”

She’s not looking at him now. “And you’re leaving…?”

_ Fuck.  _ “Wednesday.”

She freezes, her hand still pressed to her forehead.  _ Fuck.  _ She looks up at him, her movements painfully slow until she’s staring right up at him with two bright spots of color on her cheeks and her fingers holding her hair back from her face. “ _ James, _ ” she says, and he’d swear he can hear every ounce of venom she’s capable of producing pushed into that one word, “today is Saturday.”

“Uh. Yeah.”  _ Fuck, fuck, fuck.  _ He shifts his weight away from her just a little and she narrows her eyes at him. He’s going to get the dressing down of his life here in this grocer and Shepard once broke his nose for complaining too much. “I, uh, wanted to tell you, but, uh…” She’d be mad at him, or sad, and he wasn’t ready to face her reaction or what that would mean for this  _ thing  _ between them-- “You weren’t really returning my calls?” Citing her avoidance is a gamble, but he’s always been one to roll the dice. It’s only part of the whole truth, but it makes her shoulders sag.

She lowers her raised hand and clutches her basket, gazing down at its contents before she tries to talk again. “Yeah, um. Sorry.”

Silence descends. James relaxes his posture and Avery shifts her weight from foot to foot like she wants to leave or say something else, he doesn’t know which, but she doesn’t do either. 

“So will you come?” She blinks up at him, silent, cheeks still pink and eyebrows drawing together. He tries again. “Tonight. To the party.”

Avery hums quietly and glances over her shoulder in the direction Sam disappeared to. James follows her gaze but can’t see her, and he snaps his attention back to Avery when she answers, “I don’t want to intrude on your time with your friends.”

Her voice is so quiet, so small, and he can’t resist reaching out to cup her chin and guide her gaze back up to his. She allows the touch, cheeks coloring more, and gives him a little half-smile when he says, “It wouldn’t be an intrusion. I’d love to have you there, and Sam wants you there so much she ambushed you in the middle of the grocery store even though you’ve never met.”

Her smile grows a little bit, so he grows bolder in turn and leans down to press his lips to hers. She sighs against him and leans into his touch, her anger melting away so visibly that he can feel her relaxing against him. When he stands back up to his full height, she keeps her eyes closed for another moment before blinking up at him; her cheeks are still pink, but her eyes are bright enough that he feels the promise of  _ later. _

“Can I pick you up at seven?” When she hesitates, he tries, “Come on… I’ve missed you.” It’s the truth, the honest-to-God truth, but it doesn’t seem to scare her this time. The surprise from the news and the irritation at hearing it last-minute from Sam seem to fade away as she studies him, and he’s thankful for it while he knows he’ll need to have a real talk with her later. Maybe after the party if she lets him sleep over again.

She takes a deep breath, lets it out heavily, then checks the time on her omnitool. “Twist my arm, why don’t you. I gotta go though. Apparently I have a party to get ready for?”

Her voice still sounds a little annoyed but her eyes are still bright when she cuts them back up to him, so he leans down and kisses her again with a little more firmness. She nips at his lower lip and then ducks away, heading first toward the registers and then pivoting away down one of the other aisles. He’s still standing in the same spot when she reappears with a bottle of wine clutched in her free hand.

She waves it at him and winks, and then she turns away as Sam reappears at his elbow with a cart full of supplies and a pinched expression on her face.

“Why in the  _ hell  _ didn’t you tell her about going to Rio?” Her voice is low so no one else can hear, but James’ face heats up anyway. “Were you just going to send her a postcard? ‘Thanks for the sex, see ya in a few years’?”

“Sam! Shh!” James leans over her and starts to dig through the food and drinks -- mostly drinks -- she’s picked up. “It just never came up, okay?” He glances at her out of the corner of his eye and she’s frowning right back at him, hands on her hips.

“She is all you’ve been able to talk about for weeks! What is wrong with you?”

“She’s fine! She said she’ll come tonight! I’m picking her up at 7!” James tries to stand up to his full height, but something about the ire radiating off Sam is making him feel like a little kid getting scolded for feeding his vegetables to the dog and then trying to lie about it. “I’m not -- she -- I’ll talk to her before the party, I promise. Stop making that face at me, damn it, Sam.”

This is  _ incredibly  _ embarrassing. He wants to run back to his apartment with his tail between his legs and hide from both Avery’s anger and Sam’s annoyance. He’d as soon face down another reaper on foot.

“You are better than this, James Vega,” Sam says, voice still low. She points at him, jabbing one little finger at the center of his chest. Even if no one can hear what she’s saying, they’ll definitely be able to tell he’s done something stupid. “From everything you’ve said about her, you do  _ not  _ want her to get away.”

James rubs one hand over his head, freshly trimmed hair tickling his palm. “I don’t think she wants to be with a soldier, Sam. Definitely not someone in N-training on the other side of the planet.”

Sam shrugs. “So you’ll make it work. She wouldn’t have agreed to come tonight if she was just going to let you fuck off to Brazil.”

She has a point, but… “Can we finish talking about this  _ later _ ?” They’re standing in the middle of the aisle. No fewer than a dozen people have wandered past them.

She pokes him one more time in the chest and then pulls her omnitool up to check their list. Dismissed, James deflates and leans against the cart. 

Now he’ll  _ really  _ have to get Avery some flowers. 

Sam keeps up her lecture until he leaves her apartment for the little one he’s been provided by the Alliance, and then he sits there until he feels like he’s going to burst out of his skin. He can’t wait until after the party to talk to Avery. He needs to apologize first, explain himself first, find out if she can forgive him first.

He needs to know if they’re just going to have until Wednesday morning or if she’s interested in more.

He  _ hopes  _ she’s interested in more.

He finds himself ringing her doorbell at 6:15, some sort of ivy plant clutched in his hands, his nicest shirt stretched over his chest in just the way he knows Avery likes. He shifts his weight from his heels to his toes as he waits, counts to ten, then rings her bell again. 

There’s a bang above his head and then her voice floats down from the second floor. “Did you forget how to tell time, Jimmy, or are you just excited to see me?”

He takes a step back and shields his eyes with his hand as he tilts his head back to stare up at her. She’s leaning out of the window she used to smoke from, her hair in a messy knot on top of her head, her black bra startling against her pale skin, enough to make him forget how to talk.

“Uhh…” He blinks, tears his eyes away from her breasts, and tries again, “Both?” When she laughs, he tries, “Can I come in? I brought you a present?” He lifts the little plant this time and he grins when her eyebrows lift. This is more what he’s comfortable with, this teasing back and forth, and he wants it to last as long as it can before he ruins it.

“Hold on.” She disappears from view and the window slides shut. A few seconds later, she appears on the other side of the front door as she lets him in. She’s just in her underwear, a matching black set that’s plain but makes him want to throw her over his shoulder and carry her up the stairs. Instead, she takes a step back and lets him in, and he thrusts the plant into her grasp to cover for what he’s thinking.

She stares at the leaves and he blurts out, “They didn’t have flowers.”

“Huh?” She looks up at him with the same confused face from the grocery store, and it feels like she’s punched him in the chest as the memory slams into him. “You don’t have to bring me flowers.”

He shrugs. “Thought it would be nice.” A beat, then, “You deserve flowers.”

Her face blooms with color. “Well. Thanks. Let me just…” She leaves him by the front door as she walks to the kitchen, and he watches her go with his eyes glued to her ass and thighs, watching them move with each of her swaying steps. He barely notices when she glances over her shoulder to grin back at his dumbfounded expression.

She comes back without the plant. “You’re early so you’ll have to entertain yourself while I finish getting ready. You can come upstairs though if you’d like, but no funny business.”

She’s grinning at him, so he laughs and says, “Scout’s honor,” while they start climbing the stairs.

“Were you a boy scout?”

“Huh?” He’s looking at her ass again. “Oh, nah. Wanted to be though.”

She hums a little. “I bet you were adorable.” She steps into her bathroom with a wave towards her bed, and James takes that for the direction it is to sit down.

He settles himself comfortably at the end of the bed, over the crumpled sheets and blanket that’s somehow diagonally across the mattress. He stares down at his hands, the words he needs to say catching in his throat as Avery busies herself doing whatever women do to get ready for a party. She’d looked nice in the store, so what’s taking her so long right now?

Actually, maybe this will be easier if he can’t see her face.

“I owe you an apology.” As soon as he speaks, the tiny noises coming from the bathroom stop and silence falls between them. After a heartbeat, he hears the sound of plastic tapping against plastic, and Avery clears her throat.

“Do you?”

That’s a hard yes then.

“Yeah. Uh.” How best to say this? “I should’ve told you about me… leaving earlier.” Silence, so he continues speaking, staring at his hands. “I didn’t have a date at first, uh, obviously, but I did find out a couple weeks ago and then I wasn’t sure how to bring it up.” Another pause, more silence, more noises of little bits of plastic and glass moving against each other. “I should’ve warned you before Sam cornered you in the store. I’m sorry.”

Avery lets the silence stretch out between them again, so long that James is starting to regret coming early at all. She just continues getting ready, making him stew in his discomfort, and he deserves nothing less.

Finally, finally, her face appears in the bathroom door, and she looks so different it takes him a second to realize what she’s saying. “I thought you were already an N7.” The little noises he’s been hearing were makeup, an obvious fact he’d missed in his anxiety, and her scar is completely missing from under her eye.

He misses it.

“I didn’t… I didn’t say that, did I?” He squints at her as he tries to remember and her lips flatten into a thin line.

“Who has a giant fucking N7 tattoo if they’re not even an N1 yet?”

Oh, that.

“I was excited?” he tries, and her lips twitch up into a smile before she squashes the expression. “I’d gotten the recommendation, I’d talked to Lo-- to Shepard about it and she thought it was a good idea, and, I mean, the option presented itself.” He pauses, assesses Avery’s still blank expression, then adds, “I just like tattoos?”

Her gaze drops to his neck. “Yeah, I see that.” She looks back at his face and narrows her eyes briefly. He fights to keep his eyes on hers and not on the missing scar or the still-visible ones on her stomach or on the soft flesh he wants to kiss until she forgives him.

She turns away and looks at herself in the mirror, but she doesn’t step back out of sight. She still hasn’t kicked him out yet, and that’s a good sign as far as he’s concerned. She hasn’t said she forgives him or indicated how mad she is, but… he can work with it as long as he’s allowed in her house.

“You’d look hot with a tattoo,” he offers, and he’s rewarded with a real smile from her before she steps fully into the bathroom. “Like up your spine or on your shoulder.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she says, and only the laughter evident in her voice keeps him from tensing up when she adds, “Maybe I can get an N7 one to match yours.”

He huffs out a laugh and runs his palm over the top of his head. “Yeah, sure. I know a guy.”

She giggles and he covers his face with both hands, resting his elbows on his knees. Avery lets him stew again, and he accepts his punishment silently. When he looks up again, the fluffy orange cat is staring at him from the doorway, tail swishing slowly from side to side. When they make eye contact, the cat lifts his tail straight up in the air and marches right over to rub his head against James’ leg.

“Hey, Jonesy.” James keeps his voice low to avoid spooking the cat or breaking the now-overwhelming silence and reaches down to let the cat sniff his fingers. Jonesy chirps once and then leaves James alone to go check on Avery.

“There’s my baby,” Avery coos, not at all worried about being loud, and James smiles. “Are you being nice to James?” The cat actually meows in answer, then zooms past James on his way back downstairs.

James is just about ready to follow when Avery appears in the doorway again. Her makeup is done now,  the lack of her scar still jarring but not as distracting with her eyes lined in black and her lashes dark. Her hair is half-curled, part of it still in a knot on top of her head and a lock of it wrapped around her curling iron. Her lips are red, but it’s obvious she’s been biting them instead of using lipstick to get the result.

His heart sinks again.

“Here’s the thing,” she says, voice a little unsteady. “It’s not really that you  _ didn’t  _ tell me you’re leaving. I knew you weren’t stationed here and would leave eventually. It’s not that your friend scared the hell out of me -- she did, I mean, but she was polite about it.”

She chews on her bottom lip again as she releases the curl from the iron, looking away from James as she wraps the next one around the metal.

“I just…” She’s not looking at him. “Were you going to leave without telling me?”

“I’d never do that.” The words burst from him so fast he doesn’t have time to think about them, but the truth that rings through his voice finally draws her attention back to him. Her eyes are wet, but she’s not quite crying, not yet. “I just didn’t know what to say. I don’t know--” Oh the truth is coming and he can’t stop it… “I don’t know what you want to do about  _ us. _ ”

She stares at him. She blinks once and a tear escapes, so she ducks back into the bathroom and clears her throat again. He flinches, ready to follow her, but she appears again and her face is dry once more, the curling iron clasped in her hand like it’s a weapon.

“What about  _ us _ ?”

James shrugs and spreads his hands. “We have fun, yeah? I don’t want that to have to stop.”

She wrinkles her nose. “I know where the training school is, James. My parents met there. I’ve  _ been _ there. I also know how long it takes to get through it even if everything goes right and you pass everything on the first try, and I know how many people actually pass everything on the first try.” She’s waving the curling iron around to emphasize her points. “That’s a hell of a long-distance commitment for two people ‘just having fun’.”

She ducks back in the bathroom, leaving James alone to realize how big of a  _ pendejo _ he is.

“This isn’t what I wanted,” she says, and her voice is shaking again. “I thought we’d just hook up once or twice, and then we’d go our separate ways, and I’d just have some, you know, fun memories or whatever.”

There’s another long pause. James lets her have her space, not wanting a curling iron to the chest, but he burns with the need to gather her up in his arms. He really managed to fuck this up if she’s trying not to cry while fixing her hair to go to  _ his  _ going away party that she almost didn’t even know about.

“I left the Alliance and moved to earth to take care of my mom, and then she died, and then Alec and Scott went to Andromeda without me, and then the reapers came, and everything’s been _so_ _shitty_ for _so long._ All I wanted was to be happy for a few minutes, and now even that’s backfiring because you’re _leaving_ but you don’t want to stop having _fun_ \--”

He can’t take this anymore. He’s in the bathroom with her before he realizes he’s made the decision, gathering her into his arms to pull her body against his. She drops the curling iron into the sink and lets him support her weight, curling her fingers into his shirt to hold him closer. Her hair is all curled now, still warm to the touch when he cups the back of her head, and he rocks her back and forth with gentle movements as she draws in a shuddering breath.

He’s making this all  _ worse.  _ Why can’t he ever make situations better for a change?

“What do you want?” She draws in a deep breath and he holds her tighter so she doesn’t try to pull away. “If you could have anything? Your dream?”

It’s hard to hear her when she starts talking, but he’s never needed to know something more. “Anything? I want my mom back. I want to live on… well, on a planet somewhere, with a partner and a house and a bunch of kids, and, like, a dog or something.” She burrows a little closer to him, and he bends down to kiss the top of her head.

The picture she paints of her desired future is… beautiful. Why is she all worked up about it?

“Birdie…” He draws in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. If there was ever a time for the complete truth, it’s now. “I didn’t mean ‘we have fun’ like we’re just fooling around. I actually… I actually care about you. A lot.”

She doesn’t move, but she says, “I never wanted to be with a soldier. I don’t want to sit around at home, by myself, worrying and waiting for you to come back safe. And with an N7, it’s even  _ worse,  _ because everything’s classified and I’ll never know where you are or when you’ll come back.”

Somehow, despite how upset she still sounds and how embarrassed she seems to be making these confessions, just hearing that she’s considered him in the position of her… what did she say? Partner? The fact that she’s been seriously considering whether or not he has a place in her future makes him feel a little bit better about how upset she is. If he wasn’t someone she wanted around, surely she wouldn’t feel like this.

“Mom was miserable waiting for Alec to come home, and then he didn’t really want anything to do with me and Scott, and I don’t want that. I want to be  _ happy. _ ”

Not wanting something for her own future is one thing, but pushing away a chance at happiness together because of her dad’s shitty behavior? Nah.

“I’m not your dad, though,” he says, and grimaces even as he says it. “I’m not… You not wanting to be a military wife is one thing, but you would  _ never  _ have to worry about me coming home to ignore you or our dozens of children.”

It’s not an image he’d explicitly thought of before, but now that it’s in his mind…

She giggles a little. “Dozens?”

He relaxes his hold on her and tips her face up so she’ll look at him. Her makeup is, weirdly, not smudged or running, but he wipes his thumbs under her eyes anyway to dry them. If he wipes a little too hard over her scar to reveal it just that much more, he can’t really be blamed for it. “I guess that’s up to you.”

He takes a step forward so that she’s trapped between him and the counter and gives her a long, slow kiss before standing up and running his hands down to rest on her bare waist. She’s grinning up at him, face still red from how she was winding herself up, but her whole body is relaxing against his and that seems like a very, very good sign.

“We’d make some beautiful babies, though,” he says, just kind of testing the waters, curious to see her reaction, and he’s gratified when her blush deepens and she tilts her head back a little more. The arousal that swirled in him when she answered the door in her panties comes back full-force now that she’s not upset, now that he knows he isn’t the one who upset her, and he slides one hand up to cup her breast. “Yeah?”

She clears her throat and pushes closer to his hand, gasping when he squeezes her soft flesh with just the right amount of pressure. “Yeah,” she agrees. She shifts her hips against his and reaches up for another kiss, and he obeys her unspoken request. She slides her palms up his chest as their lips meet, skimming over muscle until they can hook behind his neck.

He squeezes her again, one hand still on her breast and the other slipping down to her ass, hard enough to make her gasp again. He slips his tongue against hers when she does, and she rewards him with a breathy little laugh and then a bite at his lower lip. She doesn’t let go of his neck, but she does break the kiss just long enough for him to redirect his attention down to her neck.

Her question is gasped out as his tongue meets her skin: “How much time do we have?”

He hums against her throat and lifts her until she’s sitting on the edge of her counter, then slides his hands down to her thighs to encourage her to wrap her legs around him, then he leaves his right hand on the smooth skin of her calf while he lifts his left to check the time.

“Two minutes.”

Her next groan is one of disappointment but she doesn’t release him. If anything, she clutches him tighter, locking her ankles behind him and digging her nails into his neck. He shivers, tries to remember all his friends waiting for him at Sam’s, how she immediately pulled everyone together as soon as he announced his ship date; he tries not to think about how good it feels to sink into Avery’s biotic-hot body as she sighs his name.

The decision is made just that much easier when Avery releases him after squeezing him tighter and pushes him back with her hand in the middle of his chest. He lets her move him even though it leaves an ache, a coldness where her skin had been pressed against his, and then lets her move him all the way out of the bathroom so she has space to turn around and peer at her makeup.

He stares at her ass when she bends over the counter, and she winks at him in the mirror. He reaches forward and spanks her, just hard enough to make her squeak, and then he finally obeys her wishes and goes back to sit on her bed. 

He waits in silence as she emerges from the bathroom and moves to grab a black dress hanging from her open closet door. She slips it on and adjusts the fit unselfconsciously before bending over at the waist to pick up a pair of shoes in a move definitely designed to tease him, because she right away drops the shoes on the floor in front of her to slip them on.

She comes to stand in front of him when she’s ready, and he puts his hands on the back of her thighs under her skirt to pull her a half-step closer. She smiles down at him, but it’s a little one, almost shy, and she cups his jaw in her hands.

“You really wanna try this?” Her voice is low, her meaning clear. “The whole… exclusive, boyfriend-girlfriend, long-distance thing?”

“Yeah!” James’ answer comes right away, fast enough that Avery arches her eyebrows at him. “Fuck yeah. I’d love that.” He squeezes her thighs to emphasize his point, slides his hands up to her ass. “What about you?”

“Can we see how tonight goes?” She sounds so tentative, so nervous, like she’s afraid he’s just going to say  _ no forget it if you can’t say yes now I don’t want one tomorrow.  _ “Just try it out and talk about it in the morning?”

“Sure,” he says, casual as anything and smiling up at her like he wouldn’t do anything to get that yes from her, and when he sees the relieved smile break across her face, he snags the elastic of her panties and tugs them down over her thighs until they hit the floor around her ankles. “Don’t need those though.”

“Vega!” Her fake outrage just makes him grin that much wider at her, comfortable enough with her by now that he knows she’d call him by his first name if she was actually upset. “Awful fresh of you.”

He shrugs and massages the now bare skin of her ass, squeezing and separating the cheeks just a bit like he would if she was bent over in front of him. This way he gets to see the gratifying way her cheeks turn pink and her pupils widen. 

Then he stands, releasing her, and tucks his hands into the pocket of his jeans so she won’t notice how he’s half hard again. She stumbles back a bit, caught with her ankles trapped together, and then she kicks her panties off and leaves them on the floor by her bed. She smooths out her skirt and avoids James’ eyes for a second, then looks up at him from under her lashes with a smirk.

Oh, fuck yeah. Tonight’s going to be fun.

\---

She was too wrapped up in  _ James isn’t an N7 yet, James is going to Brazil for training, James is leaving you behind just when you were getting used to having him around, did you really think you wanted to be with an N7 anyway you stupid bitch  _ that she didn’t have time to consider who would be at the party.

James would be there, obviously, it’s his party; Sam would be there, obviously, it’s her house. Otherwise? She hasn’t thought about it, and she didn’t have time to think about it on the short walk from her place to Sam’s because James is super handsy and excited for the evening ahead. 

She doesn’t think about it until she greets Sam at Sam’s front door with a hug and the bottle of wine she’d grabbed from the store -- nothing super nice, not that she knows much about wine, but it’s rude to just show up empty-handed, right? -- and then suddenly she’s face-to-face with Ashley Williams from the Normandy and how do words work again?

She remembers Ashley from the news footage of Shepard’s fight against Saren a few years ago, back when her mom was sick. She remembers Ashley from what news footage made it to earth during the fight against the reapers. She’s utterly unprepared for meeting Ashley face-to-face with James’ hand on the small of her back and her underwear on the floor of her bedroom back home.

“Hey, Ash!” James says, enthusiastic as always, oblivious to why Avery’s suddenly come to a stop. He pushes her forward as he moves deeper into Sam’s house, and adds, “This is Avery. Avery, this is Ash.”

Ashley holds her hand out for Avery to shake. “It’s Ashley. Nice to finally meet you; James hasn’t shut up about you for weeks.”

“Nice to meet you too!” Avery shakes Ashley’s hand like it’s not Ashley Williams from the Normandy standing in front of her, like Ashley Williams from the Normandy didn’t already know who she is; she accepts the glass of her gifted wine that Sam presses into her free hand, lets James pull her deeper into the house that’s a mirror image of hers, introduces herself to other people who are all more enthusiastic to greet James than her, pretends like being so close to Shepard’s old crew isn’t freaking her the fuck out.

James is the kind of man who makes friends wherever he goes, no matter the situation, and that holds up tonight. Each handshake and pat on the back makes James stand taller, broader, his grin wide and bright, but his hand never leaves Avery’s skin. He tugs her from conversation to conversation, showing her off to anyone who’ll listen. She knows most of the faces if not most of the names -- not all of Allers’ broadcasts made it to earth during the war, but most have come out again since the Normandy reentered Council space.

Almost every single person at the party served with Shepard in some capacity during the war.

In fact, there’s a photograph of many of them hanging on the wall, glowing dimly in one of those digital frames. Three drinks in, Avery slips away from James to study it and recognizes Shepard immediately, would have even if she hadn’t been plastered all over everything during the invasion, red hair (lighter and more natural, but still the red that inspired Avery to start dying hers) giving her away in the center. Sam sits next to her, practically in Shepard’s lap, both women absolutely glowing with happiness. Avery can just see what looks like matching rings on their left hands if she squints, and her heart aches. To have loved that much only to lose her? 

She does  _ not  _ belong at this party with these people. They have a bond she can’t even begin to imagine.

Behind Shepard and Sam and to the right a bit, Avery spots James grinning lopsidedly at the camera, obviously drunk off his ass, and she can’t help grinning at the sight. It’s obvious he was managing to have a good time in the middle of everything, and she can’t begrudge him that. She knows from experience that he’s a fun drunk when you keep him from getting philosophical -- which she can usually do by taking her shirt off,  but it seems like he’s doing pretty well for himself in this picture, based on the way his hand is almost definitely on Ashley Williams’ butt.

Interesting.

Right now, James is… James is…

Avery turns from her examination of the photo to survey the room. The music is loud, loud enough that she’ll be surprised if there isn’t a noise complaint and a visit from the police to have them turn things down, and there’s been a steady influx of people since she and James finally made it. Her gaze snags on a sort of familiar face and she blinks at it twice before she remembers it belongs to the guy she’d almost taken home before James scared him away.

She’s grateful now. James is way hotter than this guy, what was his name? And, besides, there’s a woman hanging off his arm and she’s never wanted to get in the middle of something like that. 

James is way hotter  _ and  _ he’s a better guy. She knows, deep down with a comfortable if alcohol-infused realization, he’ll be faithful for however long they’re apart. Even with that libido of his, the most she’ll have to worry about is requests for dirty pictures at inopportune times.

She snags another drink on her way to finding James, downing it between dodged conversations about how she knows him and where she served and why she can’t offer tax advice but thanks for asking anyway, that’s not really what she does, and finally finds him in the middle of a conversation about biotics vs. raw strength with another familiar Normandy face. 

Avery hangs back and eavesdrops on them, listening to the banter that has the cadence of an old argument only brought up again for its safe familiarity. Kaidan Alenko is easily identifiable as the second-ever human Spectre who Alec once said was a terrible choice since having L2 implants made him a casualty more than an asset, becoming even more dogmatic in his opinion when Avery tried to argue with him. There’s another man with them, leaning against Kaidan’s side and gazing up at him with such an expression of devotion that it makes Avery actually start to tear up a bit; she can’t remember his name but recognizes him as the shuttle pilot from some of the news vids.

Good for them. They deserve this happiness after everything they went through.

She leaves before they can see her, not sure what she can bring to this argument without reminding James how he reacts to having  _ her  _ biotics wrapped around his body, not sure it would be appropriate conversation to make with the second human Spectre even if he most definitely knows how to misuse biotics with his partner, and that’s a mental picture distracting enough that Avery doesn’t think about anything else as she grabs yet another drink and slips out into the back garden for some fresh air and a little quiet to gather her thoughts.

James is having a good time. He made sure she was happy and looked after before he let himself get pulled away to speak to his friends, and this  _ is  _ his going-away party. She’s never been so clingy that she’d get upset at being left on her own to entertain herself in a house full of strangers. If she didn’t feel like they had better things to talk about than how long she and Vega have been dating (since, really, they still haven’t decided that, but that’s her fault now isn’t it?), she’d be thrilled with being around so many Normandy soldiers.

Maybe Ashley will talk to her about serving with Shepard before everything else, back when they were just hunting for Saren. What was it like to be with Shepard before the threat of the Reaper invasion gave everything so much urgency? Did she know who Shepard was back then, or did Shepard surprise her the way she surprised everyone when she came back from the dead to save them from the Collectors and then the Reapers?

Avery’s so distracted by her swirling thoughts, of Kaidan and his partner, of James and their future, of Ashley and Shepard, that she literally bumps into Sam before she even notices her standing there. Her drink sloshes over her hand but doesn’t get on Sam, and Avery’s already apologizing even before she hears Sam apologizing too.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you, I can go back inside, I just wanted--”

“It’s okay! It’s okay!” Sam has to grab Avery’s elbow to grab her attention, squeezing a little to cut off the ramblings. “I’m the one hiding from my own houseguests.”

Avery swallows her next comment, realizing another apology would be overkill, and takes a second to really look at Sam. She’s smiling but her eyes are sad, the green shimmer on her skin more pronounced in the darkness behind her home. She looks back up at the sky and Avery follows her gaze, looking at the single Reaper flying so far overhead it would be impossible to see without the same green shimmer on its hull.

“Do you… need privacy?” Avery doesn’t really want to go back inside just yet, but she will if she needs to.

Sam looks back at her, the same soft smile twisting her lips. “No, no, please stay. I wanted to talk to you anyway, and it’s too loud inside.” Avery arches her brows, curious, as Sam finishes, “I’m sorry I cornered you at the grocer. I didn’t know he hadn’t talked to you yet.”

Avery takes a long sip of her drink to cover her embarrassment. “It’s okay. It’s probably for the best you did.”

“I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. He should’ve talked to you earlier! I yelled at him all afternoon. Did he apologize?”

Avery laughs at Sam’s obvious outrage, peering down into her cup, remembering the earnest way James had said  _ fuck yeah  _ when she asked if he really wanted to try being a real couple. “Yeah. I wasn’t really, wasn’t really that mad, though.”

“You kinda seemed mad, though.” Avery looks up and catches Sam studying her with a serious expression. The green shimmer seems comforting now instead of scary like it had been when she first saw it on the face of her squad leader so many months ago.

Through the haze of alcohol, Avery remembers how happy Sam looked in that pic with Shepard, sees the concern on her face now, and decides to tell her the truth. “I wasn’t mad that he didn’t tell me about the program, I was upset that he was leaving at all. My dad was an N7 and he was never around and hated being at home when he was. So…” She loses her train of thought and finishes her drink off to find it again. “I dunno, I just like him so much I didn’t want him to go.”

“Aww…” Sam clucks her tongue and leans forward to wrap her arm around Avery’s shoulders. The shift in weight makes them stumble, and Sam’s nose bumps into Avery’s cheek while Avery’s free arm wraps around her waist. They both squeal with laughter and drop empty cups to the ground, struggling to remain upright through drunken laughter.

They don’t hear the door from the house open, so James’ voice makes them both jump and fall into peals of laughter again: “Hey, you trying to steal my girl, Sam?”

Sam offers James reassurance in the form of, “I stole your Lola, so I figured I’d let you keep this one,” at the same time that Avery argues, “I think it’s working, Jimmy, you better save me!” To back up her words, she gives Sam a firm kiss on the cheek, drawing another burst of giggles from her.

“Okay, okay--” James is laughing when he reaches them, snaking one arm between the women to wrap around Avery’s waist. He hauls her backward until she’s pressed against his body and then wraps his other arm around her too, pretending to keep her away from Sam but really just using it as an excuse to hold her. “Hands off.”

Avery lets him collect her, then purposefully grinds her ass against him just to feel the way it makes him shiver and squeeze her tighter. The booze in her system is reminding her of their first night together, how surprisingly good he was when they finally got back to her room. The combination of his solid warmth behind her and her spiraling thoughts are making her wet, and she’s abruptly sure leaving her panties behind was a dire mistake.

Sam, hopefully unaware of what she’s thinking, offers them a huge grin as James rests his chin on the top of Avery’s head. Her smile starts to slip before the green light flashes and her smile comes back full-force. “You two look good together,” she says, and then she punches James in the arm as she starts to walk back in the house. “You better work it out!”

Behind Avery, James tenses. Avery waits until Sam makes it inside and closes the door to arch her back a little more and grind more purposefully against James; the muffled moan her movement surprises from him makes goosebumps break out across her skin.

“You two making friends?” James asks, voice catching in the middle on another tiny moan. 

Avery catches her lower lip between her teeth before she answers. “Mhmm…” Then, still pressing her body against his and keeping an eye on the door in case someone else decides to come outside, she asks, “Who’s Lola?”

His laugh is a deep rumble as he buries his face in her hair. “Shepard.”

Avery’s already muddled brain short circuits, and she forgets what she was trying to do to James. She freezes, his grip loosens so she can pull away, but all she manages to do is squeak out, “You and  _ Shepard?” _

He moves his hands to rub her arms, but his voice is full of laughter when he explains, “Nah, she only had eyes for Sam.” He leans down and kisses the top of her head, then leans down more and nuzzles behind her ear. “I wasn’t much her type anyway, you know?” He smiles into her hair when she shivers, and his hands grow bolder until…

“So just you and Ashley, then?”

It’s James’ turn to freeze and Avery’s to laugh, and she turns in his arms and loops hers around his neck. She’s still grinning when she nips at his lower lip to goad him into kissing her.

His hands settle on her hips, but it takes him another heartbeat to find his words. “She didn’t --  _ mphm _ \--” he pauses halfway through his question to accept a kiss, then continues, “say anything to you, did she?”

Avery leans more of her weight against him, and he slips his hands down to her ass. She beams up at him. “Why, you worried she’ll say something embarrassing?” 

He grumbles and leans down to capture her lips in a kiss, squeezing her tighter, and she forgets the blush on his face and his embarrassment as he tugs her body tight against his. The world spins around her as their mouths open and their tongues tangle, the taste of his drinks mingling with hers in a way that would have been unpleasant in any other circumstances. 

She almost doesn’t notice as his hands slip under the hem of her dress and return to her ass, not until he straightens up and starts to move, carrying her with her feet dangling just above the ground. 

“I love your ass,” he says, setting her down with her back to Sam’s house. He leaves one hand on what’s apparently his favorite part of her body and moves the other to her thigh, lifting so she’ll wrap her leg around him. She does, letting him press between her legs, relaxing as he towers over her. “Will you let me fuck it?”

Her eyes pop open again. “What, right now?”

James hesitates, then shakes his head. He grabs her by both thighs and lifts her into the air before pinning her back against the house. Now at face level with each other, they smile before he starts to speak again.

“Nah. We gotta be fast now in case someone comes looking for me.” He kisses her neck and her laugh turns into a moan.

“Do we?”

“Mhmm…” James nips at her collarbone, then presses a line of wet kisses along the collar of her dress. She bites her lips against the moans that want to escape, suddenly painfully aware of the party happening just a few inches on the other side of the wall. She tightens her thighs around his waist as his tongue touches her skin, then she grabs at the back of his head with both hands. He groans against her, then presses his lips against her ear to ask, “Yeah?”

She nods helplessly. “Yeah.” 

He kisses her full on the mouth then, happy and delicious, and he laughs a little breathlessly as he sets her down and spins her around so that she’s facing the wall and he can flip her skirt up over her ass. She looks over her shoulder and smiles when she hears the jingle of his belt coming undone.

She catches her breath as he pulls his cock free and strokes it twice from root to tip, his eyes glued to her exposed skin, and then he lines himself up with a careful precision that she hadn’t expected from him, not right now. Their height difference makes it a little awkward, but he tilts her hips and she arches her back and when he slides into her she has to press her mouth into the crook of her elbow to muffle her moan.

James groans too, a deep noise from behind her that makes her shiver, and then he digs his fingers into the flesh of her hips to hold her steady as he begins to fuck her with short, hard thrusts.

She presses her lips together and whines, trying to hold steady under the onslaught as her knees threaten to give out already. Goosebumps rise on her skin as he fills her over and over; his quiet, heartfelt grunts from behind her make her toes curl. A bead of sweat rolls down her temple, but she can’t move to wipe it away, not and keep her footing as James fucks her.

“Fuck… birdie, I can’t…” James sounds absolutely broken, on the edge already, but she can’t come like this, not so fast, not even when he feels like his cock was designed specifically for her. Not even when she really focuses on the drag of him inside of her and the way his voice breaks when he swears again and then slips into a stream of Spanish as he grips her hips too tight to hold her still as he comes. 

She clenches around him, and the sound he makes is broken. She can feel him shaking behind her, a trembling that shows his orgasm was as good as the one she’s been denied would have been. She whines, she can’t help it, and rests her head against the wall. Soothing hands stroke up her sides, then one rests on the small of her back to keep her still as James takes a step back.

She whines again when he pulls out of her, this time more in annoyance than in frustration. She’s still shaking, trembling at the sudden lack of sensation, and now she can feel his come dripping from her and wetting her thighs.

“Oh, James.” If she sounds a little grumpy when she finally stands up straight, it’s because she’s imagining walking through the party to find the bathroom before it’s impossible to hide what they’ve been doing -- as though the whole party doesn’t already know. She turns and looks up at him, brushing her hair out of her face and trying to calm it with her fingers.

He’s putting himself back together too, but there’s still a flush on his face and a wrinkle between his eyebrows. As soon as his belt is fully through the loops on his pants, he’s using his hand on her jaw to guide her face up to his for a long, slow kiss.

“Don’t worry,” he says, grinning against her lips as he kisses her one more time. “I got you.”

“Wha--” she starts, but he just gives her a devious look and crouches in front of her, flipping her skirt up at the front this time. Her whole body feels too hot as he pulls one of her legs over his shoulder, and she nearly forgets where she is when he meets her gaze and draws his tongue up the inside of her thigh.

She catches the curse before it can leave her lips and claps her hand over her mouth instead, arching up on her toes as James groans and buries his face in her cunt. She catches her breath in her throat as the tip of his tongue finds her clit, the orgasm that just escaped her suddenly rushing back under his attention.

If he’s bothered by the way she tastes right now, how she tastes with his come mixing with hers, he doesn’t show it. He just leans into her, lips and tongue moving with so much enthusiasm that she’s about to burst already. She grabs the back of his head with both hands, biting her tongue to stay silent, and he groans again when he feels her fingernails digging into his scalp.

Oh,  _ fuck,  _ this is good. What is she going to do when he leaves for Brazil?

The surge of sadness that’s been following the word  _ Brazil  _ all day is chased away by James’ fingers digging into her thighs and another quiet moan buried in her cunt. She can’t think about anything other than his tongue on her and her shaking legs, and she has half a second to hope that he’ll keep her from falling over before she comes with the tip of her tongue caught between her teeth and a moan strangled in her throat.

He licks her through it and then he chuckles against her thigh as he kisses her there once too. He eases her leg off his shoulder and stands up before she even bothers to open her eyes. He’s red-faced and his chin is wet, and he looks so fucking smug she can’t resist pulling him down for another kiss.

He tastes like her. He tastes like  _ him.  _

She wants to take him home and ride him until the sun comes up. She wants to wake him up the morning he’s supposed to leave with his hands tied to her headboard again so he’s too distracted to make his shuttle. She wants to follow him to Rio and then to wherever he gets stationed after that. She wants. She  _ wants. _

“Hey. What’s that face for?” James’ voice breaks through her thoughts as easily as the thumb on her chin does. He tilts her face back up to his so she’ll look him in the eye, and it’s only by sheer willpower that she manages not to cry.

She’s already lost so much. Why should she lose this?

“Are you okay? Did I hurt you?” He’s starting to sound frantic now, both his hands cupping her jaw with the lightest touch she’s ever felt from him. “Avery, talk to me.”

“I’m okay,” she says, forcing the words from her suddenly dry throat. “I’m okay. I just--” She grabs his wrists and stares up at him, trying to decide what to say. She just… what? She just feels suddenly vulnerable after an amazing orgasm? She just wants to give it a try? She just realized she’s in love with him when she didn’t mean to be? “I’m gonna miss… that when you’re gone.” A pause as he starts to smile, then, “I’ll miss you.”

He gives her another soft kiss, smiling all the while, before releasing her. “Don’t be sad about it yet. We have a few more days.” He takes a polite step back, then reaches forward again to smooth out her hair. “You could come visit me for a few days when I have a break. We can get a hotel room over the water, you can wear something held together by strings, we can get drunk on the beach…”

Avery finishes smoothing out her own hair as she imagines the picture James is painting, and she can’t help but smile at the idea of James in a bathing suit drinking something with a little umbrella in it.

Maybe she can do this. Maybe it’ll be worth it.

Out loud, she says, “That sounds nice.”

“Good.” He sounds smug again, so she looks back up and wrinkles her nose. He just laughs, quiet and low, and gives her one last kiss before starting to pull her toward the door with one hand while wiping his face with the other. He pauses with his hand on the knob to say, “Ashl started to walk out here a minute ago, so don’t be surprised if she says something.”

Avery doesn’t have time to react before he slides the door open and tugs her inside behind him.

_ Oh, Vega. _

**Author's Note:**

> There's one... maybe two more updates in this story and then I'm pulling it to a close. I love all four of you who ship this pair with my whole heart.


End file.
